Page 3 of 4 FirstFirst 1234 LastLast
Results 21 to 30 of 38

Thread: Aren't alcohol,coffee,tea forbidden for a vaishnava?

  1. #21
    Join Date
    March 2006
    Location
    India
    Age
    50
    Posts
    117
    Rep Power
    119
    Arjuna,

    No hard feelings please. I have not rejected any of your beleifs. I have only mentioned that they are not compatible with vedanta. Your views on non vegetarianism have been rejected even by Adi Shankara, so I dont see any reason to withdraw that. You are free to beleive what you want - but Hinduism is essentially defined by Adi Shankara, Ramanuja etc, who have composed elaborate commentaries. Try even arguing your position on the advaita mailing list - you will not get any favourable response.


    Quote Originally Posted by Arjuna
    Brahma-sutra, Mahabharata, Ramayana, Yoga-vasishtha, Harivamsha, Puranas (including Bhagavatam), Grihya-sutras, Dharma-sutras etc are not Shruti, but Smriti.
    Brahma sutras are not smriti, but the exposition of the vedas.

    Rest of the stuff are quite irrelavant, as it is very unlikely that you have read any of the polemical literature. Blanket statements like "Rudra is the supreme Lord in Yajur- and Atharvana-vedas, in several Upanishads including one of 11 great Upanishads, namely Shvetashvatara" dont cut it.
    Hope you realize that Rudra is just a common name not necessarily applicable to Shiva, esepcially when Rudra is mentioned to be created from nArAyaNa. All these things cannot be discussed in a small post like this. Vedas cannot claim that Rudra was created from the forehead of Narayana at one place, and then say Rudra is the first cause of all - you need to reconcile these carefully. There is not a single pramANa to show Narayana's origin from anything in the vedas.


    Svetavastara Upanishad will not help you. Because it talks of multiple eternal entities, talks of eternal gross and subtle nature of Brahman and all that, and naturally contradicting your beleifs. Advaita never even seeks to explain these, just pushing them away as half-truths.


    Quote Originally Posted by Arjuna
    Advaita-darshana is never restricted to Shaivism and Shaktism. There are at least two schools of Vaishnavism which are monistic: Shuddhadvaita of Vallabha and Kashmirian monistic Vaishnavism.

    Advaita (which is not necessarily Shankara's) is firmly based on Vedas, Upanishads, Agamas and is in total accordance with Gita and Brahma-sutras.
    Gita and Brahma sutras have not given advaita any room. It will follow readily since the soul has been denied the power of creation, destruction etc, and for most people, that is enough to conclude there is multipicity in mukti. Except for those who think creation is an illusion and these verses have no real value. Is creation an illusion? Krishna has heavily condemned such notions repeatedly, see 16.8. Morover, BG says that jiva is a part of Brahman (15.7). Too many verses in Gita 2.12, 15.18 etc have indicated that multiplicity exists in mukti beyond any doubt. Also BG indicates that the soul attains a similar nature to Krishna in mukti, not compatible with advaita. It was quite inteligent of Adi Shankara to work around these verses, but that does not cut it. In his very own words and indirectly, he has conceded that Gita does not teach advaita, but that he was trying to impose advaita on it. Same thing with Brahma sutras. Read these commentaries with an open mind - many advaitins agree with non advaitin commentaries because they cant find any way to reject their reasoning.


    I personally think advaita may never be talking of absolute monism, in which case it can be renconciled with VA. These Vishnu, Shiva stuff are not very relevant, except for creating a solid monotheistic religion and from an academic perspective. There are too many places in Brahma Sutras and Gita where Adi Shankara has to actually confess a form of Vishsitadvaita, due to the strong bias of the scripture.
    Last edited by Ram; 07 May 2006 at 05:50 AM.
    Om namO nArAyaNAya
    --------
    srIman nArAyaNa caranau caranam prapadye srImate nArAyaNAya namaha
    --------
    sarva-dharmAn parityajna mAm Ekam saranam vraja
    aham tvan sarva- papebhyo moksayisyAmi ma suchah

  2. #22
    Join Date
    March 2006
    Location
    Guru-mandala
    Age
    44
    Posts
    742
    Rep Power
    71
    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    No hard feelings please. I have not rejected any of your beleifs. I have only mentioned that they are not compatible with vedanta.
    Vedanta is a darshana founded by Shri Badarayana and based upon Prasthana-traya: Upanishads, Gita and Brahma-sutras.
    Shakta-darshana is "compatible" with all these, not less than Vaishnavism or Shaivism.
    However, Vedanta is not the only standard of Truth, since there is equally authorative tradition of Siddhanta — doctrine exposed in Tantras.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    Your views on non vegetarianism have been rejected even by Adi Shankara, so I dont see any reason to withdraw that. You are free to beleive what you want - but Hinduism is essentially defined by Adi Shankara, Ramanuja etc, who have composed elaborate commentaries.
    No, this is wrong. Hinduism is "essentially defined" ONLY by Shruti, which consists of Vedas (Samhitas, Brahmanas, Aranyakas and Upanishads) and Agamas (which are Shaivagamas, Shaktagamas and Vaishnavagamas with corresponding subdivisions).

    All other writings, including 18 Mahapuranas, Upapuranas, 4 Itihasas, Vedanta-sutra, Grihya-sutras, Dharma-sutras, writings of Acharyas and Gurus etc. are not Shruti, and are relative authorities (for Hinduism as a whole) which may be or may not be accepted. Hinduism is not essentially defined by these secondary sources.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    Brahma sutras are not smriti, but the exposition of the vedas.
    They aren't Shruti, but Smriti (in a broad sense of a word). Brahma-sutra is a mula-grantha of Vedanta in a same way like Yoga-sutra is a mula-grantha of Patanjali's Yoga.
    For Tantric tradition similar role is played by Shiva-sutras, which are a part of Agamic Shruti, revealed to Shri Vasugupta in Kashmir.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    Rest of the stuff are quite irrelavant, as it is very unlikely that you have read any of the polemical literature. Blanket statements like "Rudra is the supreme Lord in Yajur- and Atharvana-vedas, in several Upanishads including one of 11 great Upanishads, namely Shvetashvatara" dont cut it.
    Hope you realize that Rudra is just a common name not necessarily applicable to Shiva, esepcially when Rudra is mentioned to be created from nArAyaNa. All these things cannot be discussed in a small post like this. Vedas cannot claim that Rudra was created from the forehead of Narayana at one place, and then say Rudra is the first cause of all - you need to reconcile these carefully. There is not a single pramANa to show Narayana's origin from anything in the vedas.
    Shvetashvatara IV.21 call Rudra "unborn"; III.4 and IV.12 call Him "the Lord and creator of gods, the Lord of everything." IV.16 says that by knowledge of this One Gos man becomes liberated.
    In Taittiriya-samhita of Krishnayajurveda it it is said:
    OM namo bhagavate rudrAya, namaste astu bhagavAn vishveshvarAya tryambakAya tripurAntakAya trikAgnikAlAya kAlAgnirudrAya nIlakaNThAya mR^ityu~njayAya sarveshvarAya sadAshivAya shrIman mahAdevAya namaH..

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    Svetavastara Upanishad will not help you. Because it talks of multiple eternal entities, talks of eternal gross and subtle nature of Brahman and all that, and naturally contradicting your beleifs. Advaita never even seeks to explain these, just pushing them away as half-truths.
    U have some strange ideas of Advaita

    Tantrism holds the doctrine of Paradvaita (Pratyakshadvaita), which is in total accordance with the Shruti. Unlike Shankara's Advaita, which considers the world to be illusory (jaganmithyA), in Paradvaita it is seen as a manifestation of One Consciousness — which corresponds to Mahavakya, "sarvaM khalvidaM brahma."

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    Gita and Brahma sutras have not given advaita any room.
    Before saying such baseless statements, study first the Advaita texts (if interested).
    I am not an exponent or follower of Adi Shankara's advaita, thus won't defend it. There are people who can do this . I accept Paradvaita of Tantras, which is OK with Gita and Brahma-sutras.
    If U want to know explanations of mentioned verses in Paradvaita view, please read Gitartha-sangraha and other works of Shri Abhinavagupta.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    I personally think advaita may never be talking of absolute monism, in which case it can be renconciled with VA. These Vishnu, Shiva stuff are not very relevant, except for creating a solid monotheistic religion and from an academic perspective. There are too many places in Brahma Sutras and Gita where Adi Shankara has to actually confess a form of Vishsitadvaita, due to the strong bias of the scripture.
    IMO the only truely absolute monism is Paradvaita of Bhairava-tantras. In Shankara's advaita there is a problem of Maya, which is not there in Tantric monism (theistic absolutism).

  3. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    Vedas are not moral guidelines. They do not provide any instructions to live, except giving spiritual instruction.
    Well there you have it. You contradicted yourself within the same sentence. Your sentence didn't have anything to do with anything I said either.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    From Apastamba Dharmasutras:

    1.7.21
    8. (These are) stealing (gold), crimes whereby one becomes an Abhisasta, homicide, neglect of the Vedas, causing abortion, incestuous connection with relations born from the same womb as one's mother or father, and with the offspring of such persons, drinking spirituous liquor, and intercourse with persons the intercourse with whom is forbidden.

    1.9.25:
    3. A drinker of spirituous liquor shall drink exceedingly hot liquor so that he dies.

    10. Those who have committed a theft (of gold), drunk spirituous liquor, or had connection with a Guru's wife, but not those who have slain a Brâhmana, shall eat every fourth meal-time a little food, bathe at the times of the three libations (morning, noon, and evening), passing the day standing and the night sitting. After the lapse of three years they throw off their guilt.
    Well at least someone took the time to post a quote from the scripture answering my claim. It is too bad though that you completely tossed the Vedas in the trash--the foundation scriptures of Sanatana Dharma and then came up with a scripture that is rarely used if ever used. Then you couldn't even post the surrounding context so that we could be sure what this was referring to. Seems quite biased to me to trash the primary Hindu texts and then come up with something that is third-rate to prove your point.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    Doing so will have to be branded as un-Hinduic whatever others think of it.
    There is no such word as "un-Hinduic." It is hard to take what you say seriously when using terms that not only don't exist but don't make any sense. I've seen this a lot lately on this forum. People just decide to invent words instead of using the words that actually exist. Someone not too long ago apparently decided to now change the name "Buddha" to "Baauddha." It is a real credibility killer.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ram
    Leave alone Vaishnavas. Do you think consumption of liquor, or killing animals, or eating meet sanctioned for the smartas? They are NOT.
    Normal bogus hand-waving as usual. Anyone can follow this thread and see that as usual it was the Vaishnavas that started the trouble. A common trait appears to be that Vaishnavas seem to take whatever they believe and apply it to everyone including non-Vaishnavas. Then they wonder why non-Vaishnavas become upset when Vaishnavas are essentially saying that all of Hinduism revolves around their personal tradition. Now you just did it again. You insinuated that I was a Smarta and then included drinking alcohol or "liquor" as you put it in the same category as eating meat and killing animals. More nonsense talk. ~BYS~

  4. #24
    Moderator Note:

    This thread is going off-topic. Further posts that contain unreasonable preaching and attacking of other traditions (regardless of who is doing it against who) will be removed. The topic is whether or not alcohol, etc. is or is not acceptable for a Vaishnava. That means that non-Vaishnavas have no place to be preaching against Vaishnavism here or demanding that alcohol, etc. are ok for everyone. This also means that Vaishnavas have no place to be preaching against non-Vaishnavas saying that alcohol, etc. are banned for everyone. The topic here is about alcohol consumption for Vaishnavas. Irrelevant preaching and making blanket statements that go out of scope of this topic will be removed. ~BYS~

    Do you have any questions or comments about moderation policy? If so, please send a private message to Bhakti Yoga Seeker or contact one of the other administrators of this website.

  5. #25
    Join Date
    March 2006
    Location
    mrityuloka
    Age
    52
    Posts
    3,729
    Rep Power
    337
    Quote Originally Posted by Bhakti Yoga Seeker
    Normal bogus hand-waving as usual. Anyone can follow this thread and see that as usual it was the Vaishnavas that started the trouble. A common trait appears to be that Vaishnavas seem to take whatever they believe and apply it to everyone including non-Vaishnavas. Then they wonder why non-Vaishnavas become upset when Vaishnavas are essentially saying that all of Hinduism revolves around their personal tradition. Now you just did it again. You insinuated that I was a Smarta and then included drinking alcohol or "liquor" as you put it in the same category as eating meat and killing animals. More nonsense talk. ~BYS~
    (bold effect added for emphasis)

    This behaviour of some vaishnava is not only upsetting to others who are not vaishnava but also to vaishnavas. I am one of those vaishnavas!

    I know vaishnavas have to follow no alcohol thing but how many are really following it? I don't know.

    Anyway, isn't there some mention of a liquid called 'Soma' somewhere in our scriptures? What the heck is 'soma'? Why devas drink this 'soma'? Why indra is talked about having dancing girls around in swarga?

    So devas can have girls, pleasure, sex drink soma but mere mortals can not eh? What the heck kind of logic is that?

    Hypocrisy as usual...
    satay

  6. #26
    Join Date
    March 2006
    Location
    Sahasrarkadyutirmatha
    Posts
    1,802
    Rep Power
    191

    Post

    Namaste BYS,

    I think everyone should calm down a little, and then more constructive discussion can proceed.
    The Dharmashastras are good evidence.
    The invented term "unhinduic" is incorrect (perhaps "un-Hindu" or "non-Hindu" or "anti-Hindu", depending on the desired emphasis), but the intended meaning is clear. And Bauddha is merely an adjectival form of Buddha ~ thus "Bauddha Dharma" is Sanskritic, while "Buddhism" is English.

  7. #27
    Quote Originally Posted by Bhakti Yoga Seeker
    Normal bogus hand-waving as usual. Anyone can follow this thread and see that as usual it was the Vaishnavas that started the trouble. A common trait appears to be that Vaishnavas seem to take whatever they believe and apply it to everyone including non-Vaishnavas. Then they wonder why non-Vaishnavas become upset when Vaishnavas are essentially saying that all of Hinduism revolves around their personal tradition. Now you just did it again. You insinuated that I was a Smarta and then included drinking alcohol or "liquor" as you put it in the same category as eating meat and killing animals. More nonsense talk. ~BYS~
    Namaste BYS, this is an empty boast of Vaishnavas, claiming some sort of superiority over others in matters of spirituality. I am as good as a Vaishnava in these matters. I know plenty of Smartas who are as good as orthodox Vaishnavas( perhaps even more), who follow all these to the core - non violence, non smoking, non liquor etc, as laid out by Sri Shankaracharya.( add to that, they are less sectarian if they are true disciples of Sri Shankara)

  8. #28
    Quote Originally Posted by satay
    (bold effect added for emphasis)

    This behaviour of some vaishnava is not only upsetting to others who are not vaishnava but also to vaishnavas. I am one of those vaishnavas!

    I know vaishnavas have to follow no alcohol thing but how many are really following it? I don't know.

    Anyway, isn't there some mention of a liquid called 'Soma' somewhere in our scriptures? What the heck is 'soma'? Why devas drink this 'soma'? Why indra is talked about having dancing girls around in swarga?

    So devas can have girls, pleasure, sex drink soma but mere mortals can not eh? What the heck kind of logic is that?

    Hypocrisy as usual...
    Indra is a technical term Satay. Indra is not a deva somwhere in the sky above, Indra is the Yogi who has controlled his "indriyas" and has a pure mind. Indra is hence also called the abimani devata for the mind.

    Indra is not a demigod or something somewhere in the sky. A Yogi who has conquered his mind and senses is called Indra. His apsaras and the soma are the great siddhis that can be enjoyed by the Yogi(optionally). A perfected Karma Yogi is called Indra. Can you now guess what Draupadi is and why she was shared by five husbands? Clue: Arjuna is Indra.


    Literally reading the vedas, people have polluted it of the vital meaning.
    Last edited by TruthSeeker; 11 May 2006 at 03:12 PM.

  9. #29
    Quote Originally Posted by Arjuna
    IMO the only truely absolute monism is Paradvaita of Bhairava-tantras. In Shankara's advaita there is a problem of Maya, which is not there in Tantric monism (theistic absolutism).
    What is the problem of Maya? I dont think any system of advaita can withstand logical scrutinity as well as the Shankaraite advaita( it may have some holes as it is very complex).

    Please note that Shankara advaita is a robust polemical system in addition to being a system of vedanta. Only the best non advaitin philosophers have been able to find issues with it, and most of them have been suitably answered.

    I dont think non Shankara advaita ( based on realism) can withstand a philosophical debate. Those who tried have been very unsucessful, and that is why advaita is almost synonymous with Mayavada - the only system that can face the rival challenges head on.


    With advaita based on realism, it will turn out that Brahman himself is in bondage(compromising omnipotency), while those based on Maya this is a non issue as the bondage is unreal.

  10. #30
    Join Date
    March 2006
    Location
    Guru-mandala
    Age
    44
    Posts
    742
    Rep Power
    71
    Quote Originally Posted by TruthSeeker
    What is the problem of Maya? I dont think any system of advaita can withstand logical scrutinity as well as the Shankaraite advaita( it may have some holes as it is very complex).

    Please note that Shankara advaita is a robust polemical system in addition to being a system of vedanta. Only the best non advaitin philosophers have been able to find issues with it, and most of them have been suitably answered.

    I dont think non Shankara advaita ( based on realism) can withstand a philosophical debate. Those who tried have been very unsucessful, and that is why advaita is almost synonymous with Mayavada - the only system that can face the rival challenges head on.

    With advaita based on realism, it will turn out that Brahman himself is in bondage(compromising omnipotency), while those based on Maya this is a non issue as the bondage is unreal.
    This is not a proper thread for such discussion.

    If U are interested to KNOW, please read the basic texts of Kashmiri Shaivism, which represent the view of supreme Advaita (Paradvaita). Writings of some scholars also may be useful, for example of B.N.Pandit and Mark Dyczkowsky. The basic philosophy stuff is existing as Pratyabhijna and Spanda systems, in addition to these U may see Krama, Kula and Trika.

    Shaiva Monism is perfectly based on Agamic Shruti and tarka (logic).
    It is not a "realism" as such, for it recognizes everything as a manifestation of One Consciousness, non-separate from It. Only Consciousness is REAL, but the world is not an "illusion" in a manner of Shankara's advaita. It is God Himself who is acting by 5 powers in his own delight, and not some kind of outer entity like Maya or Prakriti which is thought of as separate from Brahman or Purusha. Paradvaita is the only actual Monism!
    Last edited by Arjuna; 11 May 2006 at 04:58 PM.

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •